For current generation, a war to call its own

Back then, we were nine, 10, 11 years old, and all we could do was wear yellow ribbons and write letters to the soldiers in the Persian Gulf. Now we're a lot older. It may be a new war, but most of us do not feel very different.

Now we are of age. Old enough to be drafted, to fight, to know right from wrong. Yet most of us still have no idea what the "right thing to do" really is.

Part of the problem is that, despite some similarities to past events, there is little basis for comparison. We are a new generation of adults, and this is a new generation of technology, of war, with endless possibilities -- a new era of racism, a new era of imperialism.

"I feel differently about war than I did before, about what this means to me," College sophomore Laryssa Hud said. "It really hits home. I never thought that it could affect me in any way."

But right now, what many people notice is that the action so far seems much like Operation Desert Storm -- distant and difficult to understand. Penn Communications Professor Barbie Zelizer said that this sensation is due, at least in part, to the media coverage of the attacks in Afghanistan, which has been surprisingly similar to Persian Gulf footage.

"There are distinct parallels between the coverage of the Gulf War and the coverage we've gotten here," she said. "Both have been antiseptic -- no bodies, no damage shown. We've got the template for a clean war in place, it's just the younger Bush filling the older Bush's shoes."

Yet, despite any comparison to what has gone before, many Americans say nothing ever will be the same -- because all have been impossibly outraged, and because this time all Americans are targets.

"The only thing I really have to compare this to is the Gulf War in '91," School of Social Work graduate student Kathy Langan said. "I was graduating from high school then. This feels a lot more real because terrorism has been brought to this country. Maybe I felt invincible.... I realize I'm mortal now."

And not only did that war feel different, but it was also operated differently on a variety of levels, according to University of New Hampshire sociologist Ted Kirkpatrick.

The Gulf War "was a conventional war in the sense that there were an identifiable army and identifiable government -- you could declare victory," he said. "Almost none of those conditions hold here, so it's almost impossible to declare victory. When do you know that you've won the war?"

But external enemies will not be the United States' only concern. In the past month, it has become apparent that an ugly new racism has become predominant in the United States. Today's students come from a generation that grew up well after the civil rights movements of the 1960s and the race riots of the 1970s -- only now to be exposed to yet another rash of discrimination.

And who knows if this backlash will die, or if citizens of Middle Eastern and Asian descent will suddenly be rendered less "American."

"Being of South Asian descent, it's affecting me in a lot of ways," Engineering senior Vijay Rao said. "I've had everything from having friends' temples being damaged in hate crimes, to people that are not able to differentiate between the fact that these are criminals, not like innocent people. At the same time I'm like, `Lets go right to military action.'"

And according to Kirkpatrick, studies show that support for the practice of racial profiling has significantly increased during the past month, even among African Americans, the group that was previously most often subjected to the practice in police investigations.

The effects of this war -- racial stereotyping, changes in security procedures, investigations and attacks -- are ubiquitous both at home and abroad, yet, for now it is both as near and as far as we allow it to be. It is real when we go through checkpoints at airports and train stations, yet strangely distant the second that we go home and turn off the news.

And while some are angry and some are in mourning, to others it just does not feel real, or even relevant.

"It's sort of surreal because I don't know anyone who's fighting over there," College junior Molly Weingarten said. "I've just been reading the news, so its not like I have any personal ties... It's very distant."

"Coverage like this is distancing, because it doesn't call on you to respond to real life images," Zelizer explained. "It takes away our capability to take in what's happening in real terms. When you compare that to reality, it's a very different view."

In fact, when the terrorist attacks first happened, many compared it to movies like Armageddon or Independence Day, citing the day's dramatic and surreal images and its sequence of unbelievable events.

"We've never had any experience of an event like this before except in film, and that's why everyone turned to fiction as a parallel for what they had seen," Zelizer said. "After we went to the television, events continued to happen. It was as if it was made for the camera, because we were already there at the television."

The bizarre events of the past month -- outbreaks of anthrax, hijackers on buses -- also seemed to evoke more memories from fiction than from reality. Like films, they seem somehow unconnected to our lives, because there is no sense of concrete causality between the two.

And, like in films, the actual decision-making power also seems far removed. Many students said they were not well informed about recent developments, or that they had not given it much thought. Several said they were content to let President Bush and his advisors think for them on this issue.

This generation is overwhelmed, confused, frustrated and helpless. This generation, still focused on midterms and Thursday night parties, can do little, and this generation feels that it has nothing to do with the war.

"I don't think that we have much in our hands right now, except that we can pray, we can talk, we can sign the petitions that come by," College senior Kate Moore said.

But while the consequences, tensions and frustrations of the war may belong to our generation, it seems that the balance of power does not. The decision-makers in Washington, those today waging the war, do not include members of today's generation of 20-somethings. And as the war progresses, with hundreds of experts predicting that this war is a war that will not die soon, it will be left to this generation to wage it.

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